[Bug 264102] ntp doesn't support unprivileged ports (works with ntpdate)

https://bugs.freebsd.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=264102

            Bug ID: 264102
           Summary: ntp doesn't support unprivileged ports (works with
                    ntpdate)
           Product: Base System
           Version: 13.1-STABLE
          Hardware: Any
                OS: Any
            Status: New
          Severity: Affects Only Me
          Priority: ---
         Component: bin
          Assignee: bugs@FreeBSD.org
          Reporter: jon@xyinn.org

Hello,

I just noticed (and spent a good amount of time today) trying to get the 'ntpd'
program in the base system working on my system (FreeBSD 13.1-STABLE atm). It
seems it actually hasn't been connecting at all and after a bunch of debugging,
I think it's related to port 123 possibly being blocked my by ISP. I'm also
using the stock ntp configurations provided in FreeBSD. 

ntpdate -d 0.freebsd.pool.ntp.org shows successful communication, although the
docs for that also mention that it does use "-u" for unprivileged access.

I was planning on using 'ntpdate' for a longer term solution but the man page
for it says:

"Note: The functionality of this program is now available in the ntpd(8)
program.  See the -q command line option in the ntpd(8) page.  After a
suitable period of mourning, the ntpdate utility is to be retired from
this distribution."

Given that a lot of people need a way to update their system clocks in this
type of environment (requiring unprivileged ports as a workaround), I don't see
how the ntpdate utility can be retired. I'm going to try OpenNTPD
implementation since I read that they support the unprivileged access.

I wanted to get some clarification on this just to make sure where the
community is at with this. Is unprivileged ports a feature that is planned to
be included in the base 'ntpd' implementation before the 'ntpdate' utility gets
removed?

Finally, IIRC, enabling the automatic ntp time update features in KDE (and
GNOME - but haven't used it in a while) correctly fixed the clock, but I think
they may be using 'ntpdate' behind the scenes or some other mechanism.

- Jonathan

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